Old Cookery Books and Ancient CuisineHazlitt, William Carew
History
Old Cookery Books and Ancient Cuisine
Hazlitt, William Carew
Cooking -- Bibliography; Cooking -- History
_To make strong Mead_:--Take of spring-water what quantity you please,
and make it more than blood-warm, and dissolve honey in it till 'tis
strong enough to bear an egg, the breadth of a shilling; then boil
it gently near an hour, taking off the scum as it rises; then put to
about nine or ten gallons, seven or eight large blades of mace, three
nutmegs quarter'd, twenty cloves, three or four sticks of cinamon, two
or three roots of ginger, and a quarter of an ounce of Jamaica pepper;
put these spices into the kettle to the honey and water, a whole
lemon, with a sprig of sweet-briar, and a sprig of rosemary; tie the
briar and rosemary together, and when they have boiled a little while,
take them out and throw them away; but let your liquor stand on the
spice in a clean earthen pot till the next day; then strain it into a
vessel that is fit for it; put the spice in a bag, and hang it in the
vessel, stop it, and at three months draw it into bottles. Be sure
that 'tis fine when 'tis bottled; after 'tis bottled six weeks 'tis
fit to drink.
_To make small White Mead_:--Take three gallons of spring-water and
make it hot, and dissolve in it three quarts of honey and a pound of
loaf sugar; and let it boil about half an hour, and scum it as long
as any rises, then pour it out into a tub, and squeeze in the juice of
four lemons; put in the rinds of but two; twenty cloves, two races of
ginger, a top of sweet-briar, and a top of rosemary. Let it stand in
a tub till 'tis but blood warm; then make a brown toast and spread it
with two or three spoonfuls of ale-yeast, put it into a vessel fit for
it; let it stand four or five days, then bottle it out.
_To make Frontiniac Wine_:--Take six gallons of water and twelve
pounds of white sugar, and six pounds of raisins of the sun cut small;
boil these together an hour; then take of the flowers of elder, when
they are falling and will shake off, the quantity of half a peck;
put them in the liquor when 'tis almost cold, the next day put in six
spoonfuls of syrup of lemons, and four spoonfuls of ale-yeast, and
two days after put it in a vessel that is fit for it, and when it has
stood two months bottle it off.
_To make English Champagne, or the fine Currant Wine_:--Take to three
gallons of water nine pounds of Lisbon sugar; boil the water and sugar
half an hour, scum it clean, then have one gallon of currants pick'd,
but not bruised, pour the liquor boiling-hot over them, and when cold,
work it with half a pint of balm two days; then pour it through a
flannel or sieve, then put it into a barrel fit for it with half an
ounce of ising-glass well bruised; when it has done working, stop
it close for a month, then bottle it, and in every bottle put a very
small lump of double-refin'd sugar. This is excellent wine, and has a
beautiful colour.
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